Who should have been the player of the match?

today's blog is the story of two performances; both outstanding, both deserving of much credit but creating a vastly different impact on the match.

look at the scorecard for game 29 between the deccan chargers and the chennai super kings who are at last looking like the side they are. their impressive young left arm spinner shadab jakati had figures of 4-0-22-4. you cannot ask for more from a bowler in a cricket match. you look at the economy rate, you look at the strike rate and on both counts it is very impressive.

now look at the scorecard for game 28 between the mumbai indians and the royal challengers, bangalore. in his first game in the ipl, dillon du preez had bowling figures of 4-1-32-3; again excellent, even a maiden over in between, but really no match to jakati's figures. as it turned out, neither jakati nor du preez won the player of the match award-in the first case arguable, in the second inexplicable. but why?

when jakati got the ball, there was a counter attack on from dwayne smith and rohit sharma but the chargers had their back to the wall having been 1-3 and with little batting to follow. 4 wickets was excellent but it came against a side that was already hobbling. in his favour he dismissed both the dangerous batsmen but it was apparent that the game was over.

now du preez bowled when the match was wide open and by taking three wickets (tendulkar, rahane and duminy) he opened the game up for his side and even though mumbai eventually made 149-4, they would have made many more had it not been for du preez's excellent burst. he should have been man of the match, no doubt.

in a conventional analysis of a match, jakati would have scored higher. but the castrol index rewards a "quick start" performance-meaning performances in the first six overs where a team builds valuable momentum. and that is why, according to the castrol index, du preez's performance, rightly, gets greater value.